When steel tube supplier Tenaris asked its white collar employees in the 2010 Employee Opinion Survey (EOS), “How do you rate your last performance review in helping you improve your job performance?” only 52 percent of the employees responded positively. The exact same result was seen in the 2012 survey. In both surveys, this was one of the most poorly ranked dimensions of all the questions posted. This was also weak in comparison to benchmark results for successful multinational companies, which received an average of 64 percent on this question.
In response, Tenaris implemented the Feedback Actions Campaign in September 2013. It was designed to improve the annual performance evaluation process for more than 7,000 employees.
Program Details
The Feedback Actions Campaign combined the following four actions:
1. The Supervisor’s Role in Feedback: A two-hour classroom course directed at all supervisors worldwide.
2. Feedback: Partnering for Performance: A one-hour globally delivered Webinar and post-Webinar discussion on the role of both the supervisor and his or her team members in the feedback process. This was offered to both supervisors and those being supervised.
3. Giving Feedback and Coaching: An existing eight-hour classroom course that makes up part of a larger program for supervisors called Management Principles.
4. Communications Campaign: A barrage of communications actions that were designed not only to promote awareness but also to train in a clear and concise manner on the feedback process. These included articles, video, posters, corporate feeds, and targeted e-mails.
Given that it had been employees who had brought the company’s attention to the weakness in feedback through their responses in the EOS and Upward Feedback, it was particularly important that employees should see their concerns had been heard. Rather than train managers out of sight of their employees, the two groups were brought together for parts of the training. Thus, employees not only better understood the process and their role in the feedback conversation, they also were energized, engaged, and empowered, knowing that they had been heard.
Results
The March 2014 Employee Opinion Survey showed a dramatic improvement on the performance review question. In 2010 and 2012, only 52 percent of employees felt that their annual performance review had helped improve their performance, in 2014, 69 percent employees responded positively.
Analysis of the 2014 results of upward feedback, when employees annually evaluate their supervisors, also gives credence to these results:
- 55 percent of those supervisors who participated in the Supervisor’s Role in Feedback improved their upward feedback results. Only 21 percent had poorer results. The others stayed the same.
- 50 percent of those who participated in the Feedback: Partnering for Performance Webinar improved their upward feedback, 39 percent stayed the same, and only 11 percent worsened.
- 58 percent of those who took the Giving Feedback and Coaching course improved their upward feedback.
